


Brainwashing

by syusuke



Category: Captain America (Comics), Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types
Genre: Brainwashing, Gen, Mind Manipulation, Objectification, Psychological Torture, Torture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-02
Updated: 2017-01-01
Packaged: 2018-09-14 02:10:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 1,893
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9152941
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/syusuke/pseuds/syusuke
Summary: It's simpler than you think. It's conditioning. It works with positive and negative reinforcing. Of course, it works a lot faster if you can use torture and physically weaken your subject. You need to use both aspects and you need to force a positive image of yourself onto your victim. That's crucial, it has to trust you. Not from the start, that's hardly possible. But with patience... The patient man wins the battle, when the rush one dies.





	1. Epilog

He screamed. A rough raspy shout. A high wail. An involuntary whimper.   
They’ve been at it for hours again. Whatever they injected into his veins, was burning like fire. It was like someone kept pulling on a loose nerve. 

 

It had all started with the guards picking the best fighters out of all the prisoners. Bucky could have pretended to be weak, he could have swallowed his pride for that matter. But he couldn’t bring himself to let his men suffer in his stead. So when the guards came up to his cell, he confronted them.

„Are you recruiting now? Did we shoot too many of your dependable guys?“  
He knew, he got himself in trouble. That was the point though, getting their attention. The guards stopped. Bucky didn’t think they understood a word he said, but he saw them glance at his insignia. He was a Seargant after all and a tremendous sniper, probably responsible for more deaths than most. 

„Der da ! Sieht ganz kräftig aus. Vielleicht hält der ja länger durch, als die anderen.“

Bucky didn’t know that much german, but it must have worked. They chained his hands and dragged him along the hallway. He made it a point to resist, pulling one of the guards close enough to headbutt him. The guard went down, too surprised to braze himself. Before Bucky could taunt them any more, he felt a dull ache on the back of his head. His vision went black and he stumbled, dropping to his knees. He didn’t understand the angry shouting of his captors, but he heard the cheers of his fellow soldiers.

 

 

 

 

\---------

 

I really don't think it's necessary to understand every word.. but for the curious ones:  
„Der da ! Sieht ganz kräftig aus. Vielleicht hält der ja länger durch, als die anderen.“ = "This one! He looks pretty strong. Maybe he'll endure it longer than the others"


	2. Arnim Zola

„Ah, gesunder Bursche! Sie sagen, er ist ein Scharfschütze? Definitiv ein Kämpfer, das ist gut.“

Pain was all he felt at first. A head-splitting pain cursing through him, he couldn’t clearly locate the source. Was it his head ? His stomach ? He couldn’t tell. He heard people talking in german. Whispering, conspiring. One voice had a hard commanding tone to it, the other was a soft hiss similar to a snake. It smelled like a hospital, like cleaning alcohol. He tried to open his eyes, but he couldn’t. He wanted to scream, but even that was impossible. His keen eyes, his most precious sense, betrayed him.

„Seargant, good to see that you woke up. We’ll be spending a lot of time together. I am Doctor Zola and everything that will happen to you, is for me to decide. See, some soldiers are fairly certain that you are the sniper that killed most of their special forces. They even went out of their way and tried to bribe me, to make your death slow and painful.” 

Bucky tried to speak, but the pain had him clench his teeth, so he couldn’t get anything out. With great effort he finally opened his eyes. It was all blurry, but he recognized a short somewhat fat man with big round glasses. The room was pretty much empty, aside from whatever he was strapped on and the table with obscure looking instruments. He noticed a machine beside him that beeped frantically and another one at his feet that whizzed loudly. He couldn’t see a door or a window, just a cruel bright light flooding the room.

He tried to hold on, but he felt his head spinning again.

“Doktor! Es funktioniert! Sein Puls sinkt.“

Bucky felt a cold touch on his cheek. His head was slowly moved from side to side.

“You’re an interesting man, Seargant Barnes. We’ll continue tomorrow.”

 

 

\---------------  
Translating german...

„Ah, gesunder Bursche! Sie sagen, er ist ein Scharfschütze? Definitiv ein Kämpfer, das ist gut.“  
"Ah, healthy boy! You said, he's a sniper? Definitely a fighter, that's good."

“Doktor! Es funktioniert! Sein Puls sinkt.“  
"Doctor!" It works! His pulse is going down"


	3. It's simple really

When he came to, he was still strapped to the table. It was cold like metal, his shirt was missing too. Bucky shivered. He couldn’t suppress a groan as he felt his muscles starting to cramp. He really couldn’t do anything against it, he just had to endure it. Slowly he closed his eyes again, thinking of something good, something cheerful. 

Steve appeared in front of him, he took his hand and pulled him away, pulled him out of their flat onto the streets. The circus was in town and Steve had been begging him to go for days already. Steve’s smile was so bright that Bucky couldn’t resist. They didn’t have money for things like this, they hardly got by. The image got blurry and suddenly they were in the tent. Steve was sketching the clowns, tongue sticking out in concentration. Bucky remembered laughing more at Steve than the act.

 

A sudden pain pulled him out of his reverie. Someone had slapped him. 

“Mister Barnes, did you have a good night?”

It was the short man again. Bucky felt extremely uncomfortable. His chest was exposed and he was restricted mercilessly. He could hardly move more than clenching his fingers. He hadn’t forgotten his goal though. He went for the one thing that always worked. The one thing that made everyone furious.  
“Bit chilly. Room service sucks too. Wouldn’t recommend it.”

Zola smirked: “I see, you haven’t lost your bite yet. Let’s play a little game then. I’ll ask you a few questions and you answer. If I like your answers, I’ll let you eat something. But everytime you lie, I’ll do this.”

A sharp paint pulsed through Bucky’s body. His body convulsed. Then it ended abruptly. Bucky tried hard to control his breathing again.

“Kinky son of a bitch. How would you know, if I lie anyway?”

“Let’s test it then. Name and rank?”  
“Barnes, Seargant”  
A shock.

“I expect full answers. Eviction is also considered lying. So, I’ll ask again. Name and rank?”  
Bucky struggled to catch his breath. He definitely didn’t want to get shocked. The basterd couldn’t know all that much, but the basics? He’d have to play along.  
“James Buchanan Barnes, Seargent... sniper”

“Very good, you’re learning. You have earned yourself a bit of water.”

Zola offered him a glass of water with a straw. Bucky hesitated, but eventually swallod his pride and accepted it. Zola smiled at him knowingly. This time he sat down somewhere behind Bucky. Only his voice left for Bucky’s senses. 

“Let’s get to more interesting things then. How many men are stationed at your camp?”

Bucky paled. Oh god, this was going to be a lot harder than he thought.


	4. Endurance

“Wie weit sind Sie Doktor?”

„Er ist zäher als ich dachte. Ich brauche mehr Zeit.“

Bucky was hardly conscious. Zola had shocked him numerous times. He had lost count at 43. He’d given up at keeping quiet too. He hardly bothered to lie anymore. He accepted the pain, couldn’t avoid it. He answered truthfully, whenever he felt he didn’t betray anyone but himself. He was worn out, too exhausted to put up a fight. The black-outs were a mercy. They made it easier to bear the pain.

“One last chance, soldier. You can still earn that meal. All I need from you are two answers. One: Where is your camp? Two: How many men are there?”

He couldn’t tell him. He couldn’t.

“The camp... it’s 400 miles north of where you captured us. I don’t know how many men they have right now. When we left, we were pretty much all they had. Maybe a hundred people left, mostly nurses and casualties.”

It was a lie. It was fairly close to the truth though. Bucky hoped he could trick his tormenter this way. It had worked before. Zola hesitated, he watched the soldier closely. He didn’t shock him.

“You’re a fast learner, soldier. I can’t tell, if you lie. We’ll continue this once the lie detector is here. But I’m curious. Why did you provoke the guards? You had to know nothing good would come of it.”

Bucky chuckled. He’d love to give a cocky reply and remain his cool front. But a whole day of shock therapy was exhausting enough, to strip him of this wall. He could pretend though, right?

“I’m way more fun than these bores. Besides it’s a nice change of scenery.”

Zola giggled. He motioned for an assistant to come in and left. 

The young man put an IV in his arm, checked the heart monitor and turned around to leave, but decided against it.

He grabbed Bucky by the throat and stared him down. Slowly he applied more pressure, until he effectivly cut off the air supply.

“Americans killed family. You suffer!”

The accent was heavy and it was definitely different from Zola. Bucky was helpless, he struggled, but couldn’t move. 

“Stopp! Aufhören!”

The young man was pulled away. He could breathe again. He heard the guards reprimanding the assistant. He understood something about needing him alive and too valuable.

 

\---  
Translating german...

“Wie weit sind Sie Doktor?”  
"How far are you Doctor?"

„Er ist zäher als ich dachte. Ich brauche mehr Zeit.“  
"He's tougher than I thought. I need more time."

“Stopp! Aufhören!”  
"Stop! Quit it!"


	5. How to break a man

Bucky couldn’t remember when it started. His days were similar, with one major variation.

He could spend the day as the entertainment programm of Zola, which meant strange injections and endless questions. Or he could be the punching bag for frustrated soldiers, which is exactly what it sounds like. 

They apparently weren’t allowed to break bones or hit him in the head all too much, but there were plenty other places they could kick and punch him. They usually chained him to a hook on the ceiling, giving him just enough slack to stand on his tiptoes. With every punch they could send him flying. They were especially happy when they got a good scream from him. He made it a point to keep those in as long as he could. But he was only human and he usually had to endure this treatment a few days in a row. They didn’t need to get creative, the damage simply built up. Soon he was too weak to struggle much, especially since they were also starving him.

There was a point when he felt grateful for Zola and his questions. The shocks hurt like hell, but the pain didn’t stay with him at the end of the day. He did his best to answer Zola’s questions. It was the only way to get food and he needed food to survive. He still refuse to sell out his fellow soldiers, but he learned to answer whatever way Zola prefered.

“We’ll start easy. Name and rank?”

“Barnes, soldier”  
He had learned quickly that Zola didn’t care about his rank at all and preferred him to answer this way.

 

“Why are you here?”

“Because of your mercy”  
He really hated this part. But it was an easy way to avoid a shock. Who could blame him for it?

 

“What is your specialty?”  
“Sniping”

“Why are you doing that?”  
“To serve..”   
A shock went through him, cutting his answer off. He sighed, he knew what Zola wanted to hear.  
“...because I am a weapon”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Feel free to follow me on tumblr, if you want to get the occasional backstory on my writing process or just discuss fandom stuff with me!  
> http://syusukewrites.tumblr.com/

**Author's Note:**

> I'd love your thoughts on brainwashing. I really think it's that simple. You don't have to be a genius to brainwash someone. You have to be able of a certain level of brutality and a bit of charm surely doesn't hurt. You need to manipulate them into thinking they can trust you.
> 
> Obviously that's only the start of the brainwashing. Bucky is still aware of it. But if you take the movie as a guideline, Natasha mentions that the Winter Soldier had been killing people for 50 years, when Bucky had been caught 70 years ago. It took them 20 years to break him and then reprogramm him as a killer.


End file.
